


Thirteen Phonecalls

by RowboatCop



Series: Thirteen Phonecalls [1]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Bonding, Coulson and his ridiculous crush on Daisy, Coulson dealing with feelings, Coulson is sexually aroused by superpowers, Coulson is the president of the Daisy fanclub, Daisy's equally ridiculous crush on Coulson, F/M, Masturbation, Mentions of Daisy/Lincoln, Mutual Masturbation, Phone Sex, Slow Burn, complex feelings about Skoulson and pie, mentions of Coulson/Audrey, mentions of Coulson/Rosalind, possibly controversial opinions regarding Pride & Prejudice adaptations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-16
Updated: 2015-12-16
Packaged: 2018-05-07 00:02:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,345
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5435717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RowboatCop/pseuds/RowboatCop
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post "Maveth," Coulson takes off to be alone with himself, until he just needs to hear Daisy's voice. Feels and slow burn bonding fluff and phone sex.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Thirteen Phonecalls

1.

It’s been two weeks without contact, two weeks of drifting around a little bit, two weeks of avoiding making any serious decisions, when he finally decides to call her.

But the decision has been a long time coming, something he’s gone back and forth about since leaving (since _before_ leaving, which he had done while she was away).

He doesn’t want to complicate her life, and right now being connected to him might do that. He also wants to check on things — wants to know for sure that everything is standing in his absence, that he has not complicated her life, May’s life, Mack’s life more than necessary.

In the end, though, it’s not about weighing options and it’s not even about deciding. It’s just that he really wants to hear her voice.

So he reclines on the bed in his cheap motel room in Eugene ready for bed, even removes the newest prosthetic model, before he calls her cell from the landline.

She picks up after the first ring, and he can hear her breath over the receiver, but she doesn’t say anything, as though suspicious.

“Daisy?”

She clears her throat, and he can hear a deep voice in the background — Mack.

“Sorry, Mr. Director. You’re going to have to finish taking out these zombies on your own.”

“Is that Lincoln?” He hears Mack ask her.

“Yeah,” she replies, voice perfectly straight and calm, and he’d bet that Mack can’t tell she’s lying.

It makes something in his gut twist.

Mack says something else, muffled from wherever she’s holding the phone, and then he can hear her breathing again.

“You didn’t have to lie,” he tells her while she’s still quiet. He can vaguely hear the varying echoes, varying background noises around her, and he guesses that she’s headed somewhere private.

“Yeah I did,” she replies conversationally, and then he can hear the quiet _click_ of her door shutting behind her, the muffled acoustics of what must be her bunk. “There’s a lot of interest around here in where you ran off to.”

“Should I come back? I can come back. I’m not…”

“Do you _want_ to come back?”

He swallows.

“I’m not sure.”

She’s quiet for a long time, but he can hear her moving around, settling down — probably onto her bed.

“Then I guess you shouldn’t come back.”

“Yet,” he adds.

“Yet.” She sounds relieved.

He has played with the idea — little half-baked fantasies where he wonders what it would be not to be a SHIELD guy — but they never last. It’s never stuck.

“I’m sorry, you know.”

“You have nothing to be sorry for, Phil.”

“Sure.”

He says it because that’s what he’s supposed to say more than because he fully believes it. He went after Ward to end it — to end the string of bodies and pain and misery — but it doesn’t feel like a victory. It doesn’t feel like anything is better.

“Coulson,” she sighs his name, though, and it makes him smile.

“I’ve missed you.”

“That’s what happens when you take off without even saying goodbye.”

“I knew if I did, I might not leave.”

“Is that supposed to make it better?”

“No,” he answers, shaking his head even though she can’t see it. “No, I knew you would be hurt.”

“I was,” she agrees. “At first. But I think I always knew that one day you might...run.”

He had told her once how losing people, the memories of all those he hadn’t been able to save, weighs on him.

“I just need some time,” he tells her, voice more broken than he means to let it sound. The time has helped, even though it hasn't helped him figure out who he wants to be inside of SHIELD anymore. He can accept the choices he's made, but he can't stomach making them again.

“And you’re allowed to take it.”

“But there’s still interest in where I’ve gone?”

“We worry about you.”

It feels good to know people worry about him, even though it’s a selfish thing.

A silence falls over the line, and at the same time they ask:

“How’s Lola?”

“Where’s Lincoln?”

He swallows as she sucks in a loud breath, as though they’re both waiting to see if the other will speak first.

“Lola’s fine,” Coulson tells her finally. “I’ve been wandering, mostly, taking it easy. She’s making the trip well, but I’ve had to keep the top on.”

“Because it’s rainy in Oregon,” Daisy suggests, and Coulson’s neck prickles a little.

“There can’t be that much interest in where I am if you already know.”

“Well, the Director doesn’t know. And technically I don’t either. I only know where you were through yesterday.”

“So you don’t have to lie.”

“Right.”

He laughs a little at that.

“When did you set up that track?”

She’s silent for a long moment on the other end of the line.

“The first I found of you was at a diner outside Escondido.”

“So really quickly, then.”

“I’m sorry. I just…” She silent for a long time. “I just wanted to feel close to you.”

“I don’t mind.”

He doesn’t, honestly. He’s not trying to hide, especially not from her.

He can almost hear her trying not to ask more questions, trying to give him space. More space than he probably needs, at least from her.

“Lincoln’s on a mission with May,” Daisy tells him. “Nothing big.”

“You were expecting a mission update?”

“...no, not really.”

Lincoln would call her because that’s their relationship — one where he calls her, where they talk, where she sneaks into rooms on base to text him things. And it’s only grown.

He can still remember the first time he realized that they had some sort of relationship, back when Lincoln was still working at the hospital, before...before.

“Coulson?”

“Yeah,” he takes a breath. “Yeah, I should probably go.”

“Okay,” she sounds disappointed, but like she’s not going to fight him.

There’s another long silence.

“It was good to hear your voice,” he tells her, more open than he means to be, but it just comes.

“Yours, too.”

“Bye, Daisy.”

“Bye, Phil.”

 

2.

“Hi.”

It’s late, but he thinks she’ll still be awake.

“Hi.”

There are noises, the sounds of her walking across base again, somewhere private. He likes the idea of it, of Daisy going somewhere private to talk to him.

“I didn’t expect to hear from you again. Especially not so soon.”

“I didn’t expect to call so soon.”

It’s only been two days, but he didn’t like the way their last call ended. He doesn’t want her to think of him like that, like someone that shuts down and shuts her out.

He doesn’t want to be that, that emotionally closed person.

“Did you have something specific…”

“No,” he cuts her off. “No, I just… Is this a bad time?”

“No.”

He can hear her settle on the other end of the line, her breath more still and the noises around her gone.

“Did you just duck into your room?”

“Yeah. You’re my dirty little secret.”

It makes him blush even though she doesn’t mean... _that_.

“I hope this doesn’t put you in a weird position. You don’t have to —”

“It’s fine, Coulson. If Mack needed to know where you are, like _really_ needed to know, it would be different. But everything is fine.”

“Good.”

He licks his lips, not sure what he really wants to say.

“Tell me about your drive. You’ve been eating a lot of pie.”

“I’ve mostly used cash, there’s no way you could know that.”

Daisy laughs.

“No, that was a guess. But I was right, wasn’t I?”

“Yeah,” he admits.

“Are you searching for the best apple pie on the West coast?”

“Do I seem like an apple pie kind of guy?”

He can hear her smile at that.

“Hmmm,” she seems to deeply consider it for a moment. “I could see it. It taps into a sense of nostalgia I associate with you. I bet Cap loves apple pie.”

Coulson has to smile at that.

“Are you not an apple pie guy?”

“I don’t hate it,” he admits. “But I usually get something with chocolate.”

“What kind of chocolate?”

“French Silk,” he answers easily. He’s had probably eight pieces of the stuff since he left the Playground, seeking some kind of comfort in roadside diners, in chocolate mousse and whipped cream.

“A French Silk guy,” she muses, as though this is actually interesting to her. “Why?”

“It reminds me of my grandmother.”

“She used to make French Silk pie?”

“Not exactly. It was a chocolate pie with pudding and cool whip in a graham cracker crust.”

“Not exactly four star material,” she teases, but he can hear her genuine smile.

“No,” he admits, scratching the back of his neck. “But I guess it’s nostalgia. Housewives all had love affairs with Jello, you know. My grandmother made every kind of dish with it.”

“That explains the Little Debbies, too, doesn’t it?”

He laughs.

“Who told you I eat Little Debbies?”

“You packed cupcakes for me, back…” She goes silent.

“Oh.”

He licks his lips, remembering that day, remembering leaving her behind. Like he’s done again.

Daisy is the one who breaks the silence.

“I never even got to eat them.”

“Hunter did,” he sighs, “when we were holed up there overnight.”

“You and Hunter were there?”

“Two days after you left, I think.”

They’ve never talked about this, he realizes.

“I guess if you were looking for me it makes sense that you started there.”

“Yeah.”

“When I was at Afterlife, were you trying to find me the whole time?”

“Yes,” he admits, though there’s something in him that wants to lie.

“Even with SHIELD falling apart…”

“I didn’t know if you were safe. How could I…”

He swallows, and he can hear a heavy silence on the other end of the line.

“That means a lot to me, you know.”

“What does? That I was looking for you?”

“Yeah. I wasn’t sure, after everything, if I would have a home in SHIELD anymore and —”

“You’ll always have a home wherever I am.”

She draws in a deep, slow breath, and exhales.

“I think that’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”

“You need someone telling you nicer things, then.”

She doesn’t reply, but he would swear that she’s smiling, he would swear that her silence is a _good_ silence.

“And what about you?”

“What about me?”

“Do you need someone telling you nice things?”

“I’m not sure I’d believe them right now,” he whispers, voice gruffer and softer than he means it to be.

“Phil —”

“Daisy,” he cuts her off. “Could you…”

He doesn’t know how to complete his thought, how to explain what he does or doesn’t want from her, and there’s a long pause between them before she clears her throat.

“Joey melted and then reformed a filing cabinet today.”

Coulson smiles against the receiver.

“He must be thrilled.”

“He is. We’re going to start him working on building things from scratch. Mack and I are going out to find more scrap metal tomorrow.”

“That’s really cool.”

“When you get back,” she pauses, like she’s afraid she’s assuming too much, and then seems to shake it off. “We’ll give you a demonstration of what my team can do so far.”

“I’ll look forward to that.” He licks his lips and struggles out the next obvious question. “What about Campbell? How’s he settling in?”

“Lincoln is...fine, I think.”

“You think?”

“He’s weird about being around people all the time. Even at Afterlife, there was a lot of space and privacy, and here we don’t have much of that.”

“That’s true. If you’re used to living on your own, I’m sure it’s difficult.”

“I told him I don’t know what he’s complaining about, since I lived on an airplane with five other people for a year.”

Coulson smiles into the receiver.

“That was tight, wasn’t it.”

“You don’t even get to talk,” she teases. “You at least had a private quarters. I couldn’t sneeze without Fitz knowing.”

“Fair enough,” he smiles into the words.

“Do you ever miss it?”

“Miss what?”

“The Bus? That...that life?”

“Mostly no. It was always a lie, and a lot of bad things happened.”

“Like you getting taken and tortured.”

“Like you getting shot.”

He can hear her swallow, maybe lick her lips.

“But I miss the....innocence, maybe,” she suggests. “I can’t wish for it back, but I think about everything we know now, everything we’ve had to do…”

“Yeah.”

There’s a noise on her end of the line and then she calls out: “Just a minute.”

“Daisy?” He whispers her name when she falls silent.

“I’m sorry, Phil, I have to go.”

And for one stupid second he wants to ask who is knocking on her door at two in the morning, and then he realizes he probably already knows.

“I understand.”

“Will you call me again?”

“Yes,” he answers without hesitation. “Tomorrow.”

“I’d like that. I’ll, um, I’ll talk to you then.”

“Goodnight,” he whispers against the receiver.

“Night.”

 

3.

“Hi, Phil.”

“No secrecy?”

“I’m already in my room.”

He’s called her around this time four nights in a row now, so it makes sense that she’s...expecting him.

“And no one said anything when you went to bed early?”

She laughs lightly — Daisy is the biggest night owl of all of them, after all.

“It was a long day, and I said I had a headache.”

Coulson has to struggle not to laugh, has to struggle against something else at the incongruity of this thought — that she told her... _boyfriend_...that she had a headache, ducked out of seeing him in order to lie in bed and talk to him on the phone…

He clears his throat.

“What happened today?”

“Mostly nothing, but also…”

“Daisy?”

“Mack and I got into it a little bit.”

“Is everything okay?”

“Yes,” she answers quickly. “It’s fine. It’s not...it’s not any different than how you and I would argue sometimes.”

“But you’re not used to it with Mack.”

“No, he was always kind of…”

“More on your side of things?”

“I don’t know.” She sighs. “How did you and I do it? We disagreed about stuff, like, _all the time_.”

“It wasn’t that often, was it?”

She laughs.

“I don’t know. It felt like it sometimes. But I never worried about offending you, and maybe that’s the difference.”

“You never worried about offending me?”

“No.” He can almost hear her shrug. “Maybe it’s just because that’s how we met?”

“Disagreeing on things from the beginning?”

“You always seemed to like it when I challenged you.”

“I did. I do. Having you around to do that made me better.”

“You ended up seeing a lot of things my way,” she tells him, sounding tentative, as though she’s not sure she should point this out.

“I did,” he agrees with her easily. “I told you once...you see the world differently. And I want to see like that.”

He can hear her smile and shift, can’t help but imagine her in her bed.

“But things are more difficult with Mack?”

“Yeah,” she answers. “I think he’s feeling unsure of himself, like me or May should be in his role. I told him that neither of us _want_ his role, and it didn’t help, like I was telling him he only got it by default.”

“You don’t want to be Director?”

“Not while we’re unclear about how my team fits in with the rest of SHIELD.”

He nods, unsurprised by that.

“That’s why I asked Mack. I think he’s the right person for the job, but if I thought you were interested, I would have —”

“You would have named me Director?”

“You sound surprised.”

“Well, we’ve disagreed a lot.”

“No. No, I always know you’re right. Even if you don’t realize it, I always…”

He swallows, suddenly self-conscious that he’s saying too much.

There’s a long pause, and then Daisy draws in a breath.

“But I think we worked everything out. I respect him, and he respects me.”

“You make good partners.”

“We do,” she agrees with him. “And I think that’s been the weirdest part. Suddenly taking orders from him when, you know, in the field…”

“He always let you call more of the shots.”

“Yeah.” There’s a pause, like she’s working up the courage to ask something. “When you come back, are you…”

“I don’t know.”

“Okay.”

He likes the way she lets it drop, doesn’t push it.

“Are you in a hotel?”

It’s not a question she’s asked him yet — where he’s been staying — and he wonders how much she really knows about his meandering trip so far.

“Yeah. I’ve been here a few nights.”

It’s a nice city, only about a hundred miles to Portland, and he’s been working up the courage for the drive. Or maybe trying to talk himself out of it. He’s not sure what he’ll get out of it if he goes, is the thing, not sure what Audrey will get out of it, either.

“Are you thinking of heading...further north?”

He almost laughs, but he likes it — how careful she is.

“I’m considering it.”

He wants to ask her what she would do, what she would tell Audrey, whether she would visit now — now when it’s going to be more about him than her. But he doesn’t.

“It’s the nicest hotel I’ve been in,” he tells her instead, “so I figured I’d make use of it.”

“Oh, what makes it the nicest?”

“The bed doesn’t vibrate, for one.”

She laughs at that.

“You’ve been picking classy spots, huh?”

“Hmm. It’s pretty here, too, and there’s a good food scene.”

“No more pie?”

“No,” he smiles into the word. “Tonight I had mussels in coconut broth.”

“Mack made us chicken and rice,” Daisy responds, sounding entirely unenthusiastic.

“Is that the only thing he knows how to make?”

“Maybe,” she answers, like she wants to laugh. “The food’s a lot more boring when you’re not here.”

“It’s good to know I’m missed,” he responds dryly.

She laughs at that, and then he can hear her swallow, and he finds himself _terrified_ that she’s going to say something nice, that she’s going to tell him she misses him, and he can’t handle it.

“Are you in your non-vibrating bed right now?”

The question is a relief, makes him exhale hard.

“Yeah. You?”

“Mmhmm.”

“I guess your bed could vibrate if you wanted it to.”

“Hmm.”

There’s quiet on the other end of the line, and then she laughs.

“Are you trying to vibrate your bed?”

“Succeeding,” she corrects him.

“How does that work?”

“The springs in the mattress all vibrate at about the same frequency. So I can affect them without getting the frame too much.”

It’s hard to wrap his head around it, the way she’s explained her powers, like she’s in touch with something fundamental about the universe.

“That’s so cool.”

“That I’m basically as good as a cheap motel bed?”

He laughs and shakes his head even though she can’t see it.

“What else can you do?”

“Besides the big things you already know about, you mean? I’ve been working on levitating objects.”

It stabs him out of nowhere, the memory of Rosalind, like he still doesn’t know what to make of her, of them. He pushes it aside, though, tries to focus on Daisy.

“Lincoln thinks I might be able to vibrate people in a good way. Like acupressure, almost, but I don’t feel comfortable asking someone to volunteer for that, so I’ve been trying on myself.”

“I would volunteer.”

“Yeah, I figured. But I might hurt you.”

“I think I could deal with it.”

There’s not much pain that could be new to him, he doesn’t think.

“I don’t want to hurt you anymore than you’ve already been hurt,” she whispers, and it feels good to know that she thinks of him that way, even if he doesn’t deserve it.

“What else?”

“I’m working on finding vibrational frequencies for common materials, so I could more easily break down a wall, maybe.”

“And you can just...remember them?”

“Yeah, it’s kind of like remembering how to play a particular note. Except...not really.”

He smiles.

She tells him more about her powers, how she’s training, and he listens with fascination. It’s nice to hear it without having to think about how to use it, how to use her. It’s nice to hear it and be able to just marvel in it. To marvel in _her_.

When they finally hang up, he falls asleep in his non-vibrating bed and dreams about her and her powers.

 

4.

“You didn’t call yesterday,” she tells him in lieu of greeting. The first day he missed in a week.

“Sorry,” he manages. “I…”

“Phil? Are you okay?”

He’s drunk — really fucking drunk, leaning against the wall by the bed because he couldn’t quite make it _onto_ the bed — but he can still hear the concern in her voice.

“Fine. I’m fine. I’m just…”

“You’ve been drinking.”

“Yeah.”

“Because you were in Portland yesterday.”

“Yeah.”

“Did you…”

“Yeah.”

“And?”

“And nothing. I thought maybe...there’d be closure.”

“For you or for her?”

“I thought it was for her, and then I realized…”

It was for him. He was hoping for something just for him, just to make him feel...something. It wasn’t even about _Audrey_ , he realized, should have realized long before he got there. It was a selfish action at its core, just like everything else he’s ever done.

“You thought you could have had a future with her, and it was taken from you.”

“Yeah.”

He draws in a slow breath and sucks down several swallows from a bottle of water.

“What I thought I had with her…”

“What you _thought_ you had?”

“It wasn’t real. The way she talked about what it was… It wasn’t....”

“Okay, so it wouldn’t have worked out long term. Most relationships don’t. That doesn’t make it okay that SHIELD took it from you. It’s still good to have closure.”

“I thought…” His head is spinning and he knows he needs to stop talking, but he doesn’t. “For the first time in...so long, I thought I could have something. Not perfect. I don’t deserve perfect. But... _something_.”

“Of course you deserve perfect.”

He laughs.

“You’re the only one who would ever think that.”

“Coulson,” she says his name more firmly. “You deserve to be happy.”

It’s a jumble, thinking about what has made him happy, who has made him happy, what moments of happiness he has found to cling to.

“It was always imaginary. It was always a hope, not real. It never could have been real. And she died for that, Daisy. She died because I was lying to myself.”

“Phil,” she sighs his name, but he appreciates that she doesn’t try to tell him that it isn’t his fault, that her blood won’t forever be on his hands. (And for what?)

“I’m sorry you didn’t like her. I wanted you to like her.”

He’s not sure how long the silence lasts, and then he hears Daisy draw in a slow breath.

“I’m sure I would have liked anyone you thought was good.”

He almost laughs again.

“I’m never gonna like Campbell.”

“I’m sure you’ll feel different when your sober.”

“I really won’t,” he promises. “He’s not good enough for you. He doesn’t tell you nice things.”

“Phil…”

Coulson sighs into the receiver and bumps his head backwards against the wall.

“I’m sorry I bothered you.”

“You’re not a bother,” Daisy corrects him. “Are you...are you going to be okay? Do you need…”

“I’m fine,” he promises.

“Will you call me tomorrow? If you…”

“Yes. I will.”

“You’re a good person,” she whispers, and the words twist in his chest, make his eyes burn.

He hangs up before she can hear him start crying.

 

5.

“Good morning,” he swears her voice is teasing when she picks up the phone.

“Yeah.”

“You have a killer headache, don’t you.”

“Yeah.”

“Coulson?”

“I’m sorry,” he grinds out. “I shouldn’t have called you last night. I was thinking about you and…”

“It’s okay. I’d rather you weren’t alone when you’re in such a dark place.”

“I don’t want you to think I’ve been so pathetic the whole time I’ve been gone. It was…a weak moment.”

“You’re allowed to have those.”

He drags his fingers across his eyes.

“You want to sleep it off? We can talk later.”

“Tonight?”

Daisy is silent for a moment on the other end.

“It’s, um, Lincoln’s birthday. So maybe —”

“Tomorrow,” he cuts in. He doesn’t want to hear it, he doesn’t want to think about it — what Daisy will be doing tonight.

The images come to his mind anyways, things he doesn’t ever let himself think about Daisy — her body, her skin under her clothes, the way her lips would part...

“Yeah. Tomorrow.”

He wonders if he’s imagining the disappointment in her voice.

“I’ll talk to you then, Phil.”

“Bye, Daisy.”

 

6.

“Hi,” she greets him when she picks up the phone the next night, but it’s muffled by something.

“You okay?”

“Ice cream,” she explains after a moment of slurping. “Lots of ice cream.”

“Daisy?”

“You remember when you said Lincoln isn’t good enough for me?”

He swallows, lets a beat pass without comment.

“I could use some more of that right now.”

“You’re too good for him,” he tells her earnestly, easily. “You’re… _Daisy_.”

“Tell me, please?”

She sounds so fucking vulnerable, and he wishes it didn’t affect him so strongly. It makes him want to say things he shouldn’t say to her, things he shouldn’t think about her, and he has to focus to stay...appropriate.

“You’re so good. That was the first thing I noticed about you, how good you are.”

“Not that I’m naive?”

“No. I thought...I might have thought that a long time ago.”

“Back when I thought SHIELD should keep no secrets.”

“But you’re not naive. You helped me see the way _I_ was naive.”

“I believe in people,” she tells him.

“I know. I’m glad you do.”

“I just want to help. I just believe we can make a difference if we try.”

“I know.”

“That’s not naive,” she enunciates each word carefully, her voice too fierce. “Just because I’m not cynical and too cool to care.”

He laughs.

“You’re an idealist.”

“So are you.” She pauses, as though she’s waiting for him to deny it. “You pretend you’re not, sometimes. You pretend you have no feelings or that you’re a pragmatist, but at your core you want to change the world as much as I do.”

Coulson swallows.

“I suppose I do.”

“I like that about you.”

It makes him smile against his phone.

“Tell me we can change the world, Coulson.”

“We can.”

“And that it matters. Even when we’re fighting against something that seems inevitable…”

“Standing up for things matters,” he promises her, he means it so deeply.

She takes a deep, shuddering breath and then sniffs.

“Thank you.”

There’s a long pause, and he can hear her eating more ice cream.

“I take it you and Lincoln broke up.”

“Broke up,” she scoffs at the words. “I don’t even know if we had something to break up.”

“You didn’t?

“We never...defined it as anything. I didn’t want to.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t have a good track record with boys.” Her voice cracks, drips with sorrow and loneliness. “I don’t have a very good track record with girls, either. Maybe I’m just supposed to be alone.”

“I don’t think that’s the case.”

“Now who’s being naive?”

“I’m pretty sure it’s hard to find someone you want to share your life with even when you have a normal life.”

“And we don’t have normal lives, do we?”

“I’m not sure you should compare us,” he whispers.

“Because I’m a lot less normal than you?”

Her voice is so small, so _hurt_ , and he stumbles over himself in explanation.

“Because you’re still young. You have time.”

“As though you don’t?”

“No,” he tells her, soberly and without self-pity. “No. I knew a long time ago that I had to choose, and I chose SHIELD. If I thought for a minute that I could have both, it was always a lie.”

“Are you saying that I shouldn’t choose SHIELD?”

He licks his lips.

“There’s a selfish part of me that will always want you to choose SHIELD.”

“Because that’s where you’ll be?”

He feels too exposed, clears his throat to try to rein himself in.

“But maybe it’s a question you need to ask yourself. What’s important to you?”

“Making a difference,” she answers. “Having a home. You.”

“Me?”

“Yeah, Coulson,” she sighs, almost exasperated, “you.”

He swallows, unsure of how to respond to that, to the way his heart pounds in his chest and his eyes sting.

The silence between them stretches on for too long.

“Have you eaten any more good pie?”

Her question breaks the tension, makes him smile against the phone.

“Yeah. More chocolate.”

“You should take me out for pie, to the best place you find.”

He likes the idea of it, driving up the coast with Daisy, eating pie in a diner somewhere.

“What’s your favorite?”

“I like lemon pie.”

“Why lemon?”

“One family I stayed with, the Brodys. I wasn’t there for very long, but it was the first one that I really wanted. We would pick lemons in the yard and make lemon curd.”

“With meringue?”

“Lots of whipped cream,” she corrects him, and Coulson smiles. “For a long time, it made me sad to eat it.”

“But now it’s a happy memory?”

“Yeah,” she agrees. 

“I’ll take you out for pie when I get back,” he promises.

There’s a pause, and he imagines she wants to ask when it will be. She’s been so patient — unbelievably patient with not asking.

“I’ll look forward to that.”

“Me, too.”

They talk for a long time about pie and desserts and some memories of childhood, things he hasn’t talked about with someone so openly in a long, long time. By the time they hang up, Daisy has finished way too much ice cream, and his eyelids are heavy even as his lips are stretched into a smile.

 

7.

“Turn on HBO.”

Coulson pulls back and looks at the receiver, a little startled by Daisy’s non-greeting, but does as requested.

Keira Knightley and Rosamund Pike in period dress fill his screen, and he has to smile.

“You’re watching _Pride and Prejudice_.”

“Oh yeah,” she sighs. “It’s my favorite breakup movie.”

“So you can imagine your Mr. Darcy crawling back to you on his belly?”

“Pff. Lincoln is _not_ my Mr. Darcy.”

That makes him smile, probably more than it should.

“I take it you don’t need much comforting.”

“No. But I wouldn’t turn it down if you want to tell me how great I am.”

“If you’re Elizabeth Bennet, he’s…”

“Wickham?”

“I was going to say Mr. Collins. Not a full on bad guy, just not worth your time.”

Daisy laughs at that, and he smiles against the phone, more than a little pleased that he could make her so happy.

“I like this version,” he tells her, his voice too quiet as he settles back on his bed.

“Me, too. I mean, I like the miniseries and everything. It’s good for spending six hours not thinking about life.”

“And Colin Firth is very dreamy,” he teases, only partly joking.

“Is he your type, then?”

Coulson laughs.

“Maybe.”

“I like Macfayden’s Darcy,” she sighs. “He’s so…”

“Awkward?”

“Yeah.”

“And then he falls hopelessly in love and can’t figure out how to behave himself.”

“You sound like you have a lot of sympathy for that,” Daisy teases.

He sort-of laughs, not quite real.

“I’ve had my share of hopeless loves.”

She makes a _hum_ in the back of her throat, like a noise of pity and maybe understanding, but goes silent as they watch their leads argue, Lizzie walking away triumphantly.

“I like Keira Knightley,” she whispers quietly over the receiver.

“As Elizabeth Bennet?”

“Hmm, also just in general.”

“Is she _your_ type?”

“Oh yeah,” Daisy sighs, and Coulson can’t help but smile again.

They fall into watching the film, quiet as Jane falls ill at Netherfield, until Daisy clears her throat.

“I’ve been thinking,” she tells him, voice quiet and tentative.

“Yeah?”

“Do you really think we have to chose between SHIELD and…”

“Love?” He supplies for her.

“I was going to say normal relationships. I hope we don’t have to give up love.”

“I have to choose,” he tells her. “Maybe you —”

“Why do you have to choose?”

“Do you know what Audrey told me?”

“What?”

“That she always knew that one day I would choose SHIELD. I had already...we had already been seeing less of each other. It was when I was working on Project TAHITI.”

“Maybe you’d be better at finding a balance, now.”

“That’s what I thought when I…” He swallows. “When I decided to keep seeing Rosalind.”

It hurts less, like he’s put something to rest inside of him, but it still hurts. He’ll live with it forever, the fact that she’s dead because of him, because he decided to try.

“You liked her.”

“I wanted to? I thought I could make it fit.”

He doesn’t know how to quantify it, except that he was willing to see. But even that willingness was _something_ , something more than he’d thought he’d ever have, and even that cost him dearly.

“You know that if you decided to like someone else…”

“They wouldn’t end up bleeding out in my arms?”

She doesn’t answer; he can hear the awkwardness, how much she doesn’t know what to say.

“It’s happened twice, now.”

“Twice?”

“I was able to save you, though.”

She takes in a loud breath, like he’s surprised her, and then she seems to recover herself.

“And look, I’m still here.”

He closes his eyes, suddenly overcome with the desire — the need — to feel that she’s alive, to feel her pulse or the warmth of her skin. For now, he settles for the sound of her breath on the other end of the line.

“Oh, I like this part,” Daisy whispers, and Coulson opens his eyes to watch Mr. Darcy hand off Lizzie into a carriage, the shock of bare hand on bare hand, skin on skin.

He’s _jealous_ , he realizes, of that touch, and he flexes his fingers, remembering the feel of Daisy’s hand on his.

“Very sensual,” he agrees.

“Hmmm.”

He wonders if she’s thinking about it, too, about touching him, about the times they’ve touched. Quickly, though, he shakes off the thought that Daisy would think of him like _that_.

Things lighten as the movie does, as she giggles at Mr. Collins and his ridiculousness.

“I think I only wanted Lincoln because he was like me.”

“It makes sense. I imagine it can feel very lonely to feel like you’re…”

“Not human.”

“Is that how it works?”

“I don’t know,” Daisy sighs, shakes her head. “I don’t know how it works and I thought maybe he did. I thought it would make me less lonely.”

“And did it?”

“No,” she sort of laughs. “But see, I think that was my problem. I was trying to have a relationship just because I thought maybe it could work, that because he was like me, I could make it work. Not because…”

“Not because you were in love.”

“Yeah. And I’m done with that.”

“You’ll only marry for love,” he teases, and gets a laugh in return.

“Yes. I don’t believe we have to choose.”

She sounds so sure, and he finds he wants to believe her more than anything.

“Oh, I love this part, too,” she sighs as Darcy and Lizzie dance, and Coulson can’t hold back a laugh.

“You like a lot of things in this movie.”

“Well, yeah. They’re so....”

“Intense,” he supplies, as the crowd disappears around their leads.

“Mmhmm.” Her voice is breathy, almost like she’s aroused by the action on screen. “I like that feeling, you know? Of someone who looks at you like you’re the only person that matters.”

“Yeah.”

She goes quiet on the other end of the line, and he half watches and half listens to her breathe, like he’s clutching onto a connection to her with everything he's got. Daisy becomes like another character in the movie — the way her breath speeds up slightly when Darcy and Lizzie are on screen together, the way she sighs wistfully when they’re not.

She exhales hard, almost a sigh, after the confession of love and the letter, and sort of laughs at herself as she draws in a deep breath.

“You still there?”

“Yeah,” he answers. “After the worst proposal in literature.”

“It’s not that bad,” she defends it.

“He basically tells her he could do better.”

“No, no. He’s been giving himself all these reasons why they couldn’t ever, and here he’s telling her that he doesn’t care about them anymore.”

“Hmm.”

“I mean, he needed to do it better, but once she realizes what he meant, I think it’s very romantic.”

“Because he just wants her.”

“Because even if there are a million reasons why they shouldn’t, none of those are as important as how he feels for her.”

“You’re right.” He clears his throat. “That _is_ romantic.”

But of course she would find that romantic — throwing away the rulebook, telling the system to fuck off. It makes him smile.

She sighs again, and they lapse into mostly-silence.

“Oh.”

It’s a breath over the line, and Coulson smiles as Darcy walks out of the early morning mist.

“I’m guessing you love this part,” he teases.

“Don’t you?”

“Yeah, very romantic.”

“Mmhmm.”

She’s quiet for the rest of the movie, and he listens to her breathe almost as much as he watches.

Over the credits, she moans, and he imagines her stretching, imagines the soft little whimper comes because she arches her back after lying too long in one position.

He thinks about it too much, about Daisy stretching on her bed, about the arch of her spine and the line of her throat, and how her lips must be parted.

“Are you in your bunk?”

“Yeah,” she answers, sleepy and almost sensual, and then clears her throat. “I took the TV.”

She says it almost defensively, but it just makes him smile.

“Good for you.”

There’s a quiet pause between them.

“Thank you for watching with me.”

“It’s been a while,” he answers, shrugging even though she can’t see him. He doesn’t mind watching _Pride and Prejudice_ at all, but he’d also sit through pretty much any movie if it meant having her in his ear.

“Next time, you can pick a movie,” she suggests.

“It’s a date.”

He pauses awkwardly, uncomfortable with the word, unsure if he should take it back or try to explain it, but Daisy just sounds normal, sleepy, perfectly satisfied, when she whispers:

“Goodnight, Phil.”

“Goodnight.”

 

8.

“Hello?”

He answers the room phone cautiously; this doesn’t seem the kind of place that would have calls from the front desk.

“Hi,” he hears Daisy’s voice, sounding just as cautious. “I hope you don’t mind, but I missed a call from an Oregon area code and I figured it was you.”

He’d gotten no answer an hour ago, has been debating with himself about how long to wait before trying again. Whether it seems too desperate to try again. It’s become such a habit, though, such a necessity — Daisy’s voice in his ear every night.

“I don’t mind. I’m glad you called back.”

“That’s good. I can’t talk long, I just wanted to tell you — we’re out in Pennsylvania on a mission.”

That means it’s after four in the morning for her, but also that time probably doesn’t mean much.

“Anything serious?”

“No. Just a pick up. Reports of some minor destruction. We haven’t found her yet.”

“Her?”

“We think so.”

“Are you…”

“I took a walk to get some space,” she answers, as though she knows the question. “We’re all crammed in a tactical van, and I don’t know why I thought it would be a good idea.”

“Who’s ‘all’?”

“Me and Joey and Lincoln. It’s my first real mission as a leader with just the three of us.”

“Congratulations,” he tells her, and he means it honestly — Daisy is a great leader, this is something she has wanted, something she has deserved, something he wishes he could have given to her.

“Yeah.”

“How’s it going?”

“Ask me when I’ve had more sleep and haven’t been closed up with Lincoln for seven hours,” she answers, sounding annoyed.

“I’m sorry,” he winces in sympathy.

“I’ll live. It’s what I wanted after all, right? To have this team.”

“Not _exactly_ what you wanted.”

“Yeah, no,” she laughs. “I have to go. I’ll be back in two days, though, if you —”

“I will.”

“Okay.”

“I’ll talk to you then. And good luck.”

“Thanks.”

 

9.

“Hi.”

“Daisy?”

He’s still half asleep, had picked up the receiver more out of habit than on purpose.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“‘s okay.”

“No, I —”

“It’s fine.”

There’s a silence on the other end, and he glances over at the clock — they’d hung up less than six hours ago.

“Are you still in Pennsylvania?”

“Yup.”

“Have you slept?”

“Nope.”

“Shit, I’m sorry.”

“I just really wanted to hear your voice.”

“My voice?”

“Yeah, it…” She laughs. “It relaxes me. And I kicked Joey and Lincoln out of the van for a while so I could relax.”

It makes him blush, the idea that his voice _relaxes_ her.

“What would you like me to say?”

“What are you going to do today?”

“I don’t know, yet.”

“Hmm, I bet that’s nice.”

“What is?”

“Waking up and knowing that you can do whatever you want? No responsibilities, no people who need things from you?”

“It’s not bad. No decisions to make.”

“Hmm.”

“There’s a craft fair near here I was thinking I would check out.”

“What do you do at a craft fair?”

“Look at folk art? Eat from food trucks.”

“That sounds much better than staying in a van with people who don’t like each other.”

“I’m so sorry —”

“Just talk to me,” she requests again, and then lets out a noise, almost a quiet _moan_.

“Yesterday I went to a history museum and walked through an exhibit about World War II. That’s what I was supposed to major in, in college, you know.”

“I didn’t,” she whispers, her voice high and breathy in a way that makes his ears tingle and his cock get hard. He blames the early hour, his sleepy brain, and tries to ignore it.

“Before I joined SHIELD, I liked history. My dad taught it, in addition to coaching, and when I was young he would tell me about battles and treaties and the way nations were made. Real stories, not the sanitized stuff in text books.”

“People’s history,” she suggests, and her voice is still just a little bit _off_ , pitched to make him shiver, to make him want to wrap his hand around his cock. He clutches the phone instead, tries not to think about what she might be doing because there’s no way.

“I read Howard Zinn in high school,” he agrees. “And I started finding references to SHIELD, ones that they probably didn’t want found.”

“Little Phil was a troublemaker.”

She kind of laughs the words, and they sound so _good_ in her voice, he has to curl his fingers tighter around the receiver and clench his jaw.

“I’m sure Nick Fury thought so. I wanted to know everything there was to know; it was really hard, at first, to accept that there were limits to what I was allowed to know.”

“Sounds familiar.”

“Yeah, I suppose it was. But I gave up. Maybe I shouldn’t have, maybe if I had refused to stop digging I would have —”

“Stop.” She takes in a slow breath, and her voice sounds back to normal. “None of that is on you.”

“Yeah.” Except he’s played through a thousand what-if scenarios where he’s able to stop Hydra. “Sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize.”

“I was supposed to be relaxing you.”

Daisy laughs, sounds vaguely embarrassed, and he wonders if she was really...

“I won’t be able to relax until I’m back home anyways.”

It sounds so good to hear her call the Playground that — _home_. Her home. His home, too.

“I’ll be glad to help, then, if you want.”

She hums a quiet noise, something pleased and pleasant sounding, something that reminds him his cock is still hard.

“Lincoln and Joey are going to be back soon. With coffee and food.”

“You sent them together?”

“No, Joey’s getting Starbucks, Lincoln’s getting McMuffins.”

He smiles at that.

“I’ll talk to you tomorrow night.”

“And you’ll _relax_ me?”

She sounds so purposefully _suggestive_ , and he doesn’t know what to do with it, can only swallow against the image he pulls up of Daisy with her hand…

He sucks in a breath.

“Yeah.”

“Good.”

“Good luck today.”

“Thanks,” Daisy whispers. “Have fun at the craft fair,” she teases, voice playful and light as she hangs up.

Once he lays the receiver back across the cradle, he bends his stump behind his head and lets his right hand trace down under the blankets to circle his cock. He comes almost too quickly, too easily, just remembering the sound of her soft moan in his ear.

 

10.

“Hi,” her voice is soft, and he’s quiet as he listens to her walk across base. The secrecy probably isn’t necessary — they’ve both admitted to that by now — but he likes it still.

Being her dirty little secret.

“Are you feeling better?”

“Yeah,” she closes herself inside her bedroom — he’s familiar with this sound now, the way Daisy sounds different in her bedroom, away from the rest of the base. It’s the lack of background noise, the lack of echo, but he swears it’s something in her voice, too, something more private and quiet and just for him.

“How did the mission go?”

“Okay. Not great, but okay.”

“You found the woman?”

“Yeah, we found her. Yo-yo. That part was fine, and she came back with us.”

“What can she do?”

His curiosity, excitement, creeps in a bit too much.

“We don’t fully understand it yet. She can run _really_ fast, but then suddenly she’s back where she started. I think she snaps back, but Lincoln thinks she might not actually move at all. More like Alisha’s projection.”

“And now she has you to help her figure it out.”

“Yeah,” she agrees.

“How’s… How are things with Lincoln?”

“Awkward. I’m not sure we can work together.”

“Is he that petty?”

“He’s questioning me at every turn. Mack, too. And maybe I could handle it, but it obviously makes Joey uncomfortable. I don’t know how to deal with it, and I think Mack is ready to kick him out.”

“Questioning can be good, right?”

“Not like Lincoln does it. He doesn’t respect me. He thinks I’m naive.”

Coulson presses his lips together, holds back some unflattering things he could say about a kid who gave himself over to a plan for genocide calling _Daisy_ naive. (He shouldn’t judge too harshly, after all, has been very much the same kind of naive in his past.)

“Why do you think he’s with SHIELD?”

“For me,” she answers. “A little bit for safety, because he had nowhere better to be, but if I weren’t here I think he would have left.”

“So you think he will now?”

“I hope so. Is that bad? That I hope he’ll leave, after I tried so hard to get him here? When it’s not really safe for him to be out there?”

“It sounds like you’d both be better off for it.”

“Yeah.”

She sighs deeply.

“I’m sorry it’s been difficult.”

“Yeah.”

“Do you —”

“Could we talk about something different? I’m… I’d just like to think about nice things.”

She wants to _relax_ , he remembers.

“Of course. What do you want to talk about?”

“Tell me what you did today?”

“I drove out to the ocean.”

“A little cold for that, isn’t it?”

“For swimming, maybe,” he agrees.

“But you didn’t swim.”

“No, I just sat out on the beach in the sun.”

“Just you all alone in the sun?”

“Yeah.”

“Hmmm, did you take Lola’s top off?”

Her voice sounds almost _sensual_ , a quiet _hum_ like she’s settling back in her bed while thinking about him, and suddenly he’s rock hard in his sweats.

“Yes,” he manages, a little high pitched and awkward.

“What did you wear?”

“Daisy?”

“I want to picture you at the beach, just like you were. Lola with her top down and the wind in your hair.”

“A tank. I took off my buttondown.”

“Mmm. So you got sun on your arms.”

“Yeah,” he agrees.

“I miss the beach,” Daisy tells him in that same voice — breathy and almost a moan, and it’s a struggle not to touch himself.

“We could go to the beach,” he suggests almost out of nowhere.

“Yeah? Just you and me?”

“We can take Lola.”

“When it’s warm enough for bathing suits?”

His breath catches in his chest at the thought of her, of Daisy, in a bathing suit, and without meaning to he drops his hand to press against his groin — just pressure on his erection.

“If you want.”

“I do,” she sighs. “Just ignoring the rest of the world and getting sun and swimming in the ocean?”

“Yeah,” his lips curl into a smile around the word and he rubs his palm against himself, squeezing his fingers slightly around his erection encased in cotton.

It should feel more lewd than it does, more inappropriate, but as they lapse into a comfortable silence, it just feels _good_.

“Keep talking,” Daisy sighs quietly, and he swears her voice is so…

“About what?”

“Anything.”

“I haven’t been in the ocean in years.”

The last time was with Audrey, and the thought of her doesn’t bother him, but it seems wrong to bring her up.

“No?” Her voice is higher, breathier, on the word, and if he didn’t know better he would think she was — “Phil?”

“Daisy,” he whispers her name back and slips his hand under his sweats, barely holding back a moan as he wraps his fingers around himself. The sound of her breath in his ear already has him almost pulsing in his hand. “I’d like to swim in the ocean with you.”

“Me, too. I want to just have fun with you.”

“Fun?”

“Mmmhmm,” she manages to sound teasing and sensual at the same time, “you remember what that is, right?”

His hand stills on his cock, though he keeps squeezing at the base as he imagines _playing_ with her, chasing her through the water.

“You might have to remind me,” he answers, though, as he twists his palm over the head of his cock.

“I can do that. Just you and me having fun. In bathing suits.”

“Daisy,” he moans her name as the image presents itself again — Daisy in a little two piece, Daisy pressing her bare skin to his, Daisy’s half-naked body buoyant in the water.

“Would you like to see me in a bikini?”

“Yeah,” he grunts, as he slides his hand over himself faster. “Yeah I would.”

“I want to see you —”

She breathes out harshly against the phone receiver, and it makes him shiver like she’s blowing in his ear, makes his breath hitch noticeably as he strokes himself, but he’s past caring.

“Shit,” she almost laughs out a sigh, this deeply satisfied sound, and just the thought of it — that this is what Daisy sounds like when she _comes_ — sets him off.

He’s not as quiet as she was, unable to stifle a groan, but she doesn’t comment as he draws in a deep slow breath in the aftermath.

“I’m going to hold you to that, you know.”

“Hold me to it?”

Daisy laughs quietly.

“We’re going to the beach. You and me and bathing suits.”

“I…” He thinks about his scar for a moment, thinks about hiding himself from her, but decides that isn’t who he wants to be. “I’d like that.”

“Good.”

There’s a breath between them, and then Daisy yawns.

“I’ll let you get to sleep,” Coulson whispers.

They whisper their goodnights, and even though he thinks it should be awkward, it’s just...not.

 

11.

“Hi.”

He’s not sure if her voice really sounds different, or if — after last night — he’s just hearing the sounds that have haunted his thoughts all day. At certain points, he’s convinced himself he imagined it, or at least her part of it.

“Hi.”

There’s a long pause between them, the awkwardness of having to figure out the rules again.

“So, Lincoln left the base today.”

Or maybe there aren’t new rules at all.

“How do you feel about that?”

“Good,” Daisy answers, though she sounds guilty. “He doesn’t belong here, and it will just make things...easier.”

“I’m glad, then. Where’s he headed?”

“We set up a position for him at a hospital in Nevada. It’s not perfect, and I’ll have to keep an eye on him, but…”

“But it’s better than him making your life miserable, and he’ll be happier with more privacy.”

“Pretty much.”

“What did you do today besides ditch Lincoln?”

She laughs, almost a giggle, and then sighs.

“Training with Joey and Yo-Yo. Joey’s really happy to have someone he can help.”

“That’s good.”

“I’m going to have to take them outside soon, somewhere really big and empty. Yo-Yo needs more space, and I want Joey to try building something big.”

“And what about you?”

“I’ve been working on levitating and then throwing things.”

“That is _so_ cool,” he whispers, which gets him a laugh.

“Mack calls us the Power Rangers.”

“Well, you are a superhero team.”

“I guess we kind of are, huh?” She pauses. “I like how enthusiastic you are about it. About...me.”

“I like hearing about what you can do,” he tells her, somewhere between an assurance and an admission.

“I’ve been working on more therapeutic uses, too. Making smaller vibrations on my body, like a massage.”

Just the idea is arousing — Daisy using her powers in an intimate way.

“And how’s that...going?”

“Pretty well,” she sighs, and he wonders if she’s doing it now. “I think I’m ready to try on someone else.”

“You still need a volunteer?”

“I was hoping you would still be interested.”

“I am.”

There’s a silence between them, and Coulson gives in to the desire to run his hand down his body, to cup his half-hard cock in his right hand.

“You’re not even going to ask how it works first?”

He swallows.

“How does it work?”

“I lay my hand somewhere, like my thigh, right on the skin.”

She shifts, and he can imagine she’s tugging down her pajamas to lay her hand over her bare thigh. He can’t quite hold back a whimper at the surge of arousal, at the surge of blood to his groin.

“And then if I concentrate, I can feel how the different muscle groups vibrate...differently.”

“And you can affect different ones.”

It’s exciting in a different way, just plain _cool_ to think about the fact that Daisy can pick up a car and throw it, but she can also ease a sore muscle. And it’s arousing all over again to think about the fact that she could turn all that power, all that destructive potential, into _pleasure_.

“Yeah, very gently.”

“And you can do that anywhere?”

“I’ve been practicing on different spots,” she agrees, and then draws in a slow breath, and when she speaks again, her voice is soft and sensual, the sound that has lived in the back of his mind all day. “Some...really, _really_ good spots.”

Coulson grunts as he shoves his hand down his sweats and wraps his fist around his cock.

He pumps his hand over himself as he listens to her breathe, attuned to every hitch in her breath, to every almost-moan.

“Tell me more,” he whispers, swallowing back any sense of shame because Daisy wants this, so it can’t be wrong.

“About what?”

“Your powers,” he breathes the word, too reverent to his own ears. “Tell me more about what you can do.”

“You’ve already seen most of it,” she reminds him, but she doesn’t sound annoyed, more teasing.

“Tell me anyways.”

“You like hearing about that, Phil?”

“You know I do.”

He swears he can hear her smile.

“I caused an avalanche.”

“ _Yeah_.”

“That was the first time I really knew what I was doing. I could feel the mountain, and I...moved it.”

“God, Daisy.”

He has to slow his hand down, trying to make this last.

“It’s strange to think about — what I can do.”

“It’s amazing,” he whispers. “You’re amazing.”

“Hmm,” she sighs. “When you get back, I’m going to start on your back.”

Her words make him shudder, almost lose control.

“Oh?” It’s a high pitched little sound as he pulls his hand off his cock, which still pulses so hard he’s worried he’ll come anyways.

“Does that sound okay?”

“Yes,” he answers, too adamant. All he can think is that if it’s Daisy, if it’s Daisy’s hands and Daisy’s powers on his back, he’ll never be reminded of Tahiti and false memories.

“And then down your spine to your legs.”

He drops his hand to cup his balls to squeeze lightly, but he can’t keep his hips from pulsing, he’s so desperate for more contact.

“Daisy,” he breathes, enjoying the way it feels in his mouth.

“I like the way you say my name.”

“ _Dai_ sy,” he says it again, soft and reverent. “Daisy.”

“ _Coul_ son,” she gasps back, and the little hitch in her breath gives her away, even though the quiet moans she makes barely carry over the phone. He just grips his cock as he listens, as he takes in the sounds with full knowledge of what they are, of what he’s hearing, as he imagines being there in person.

As soon as she pulls in a deep breath — as soon as he can tell she’s finished — he pumps his hand over himself again, not holding back anything. And it takes so little — so very little — before he’s shuddering through an orgasm, not even trying to cover the desperate little grunts in the back of his throat.

“I want to watch you in person,” she whispers as he’s starting to relax, and it almost sets him off again. It’s as much the fact that she’s brushing up against naming what they’re doing here, not leaving it unspoken between them, as it is the idea of watching her come.

Although, he desperately wants to watch her come.

“Me, too.”

“That’s good, Coulson.”

“Soon,” he adds.

“Soon?”

“Really soon.”

 

12.

He calls her from his cell phone for the first time since he left, sitting outside in Lola under the stars.

“You turned your cell back on,” she breathes when she answers, like this is big.

“Yeah.”

“Does this mean…”

“I’m headed back,” he agrees. “I’m ready to come home, but it’s been nice to just be...me.”

“Not the SHIELD guy.”

“Not the SHIELD guy, yeah.”

“I think I kind of like you when you’re just being you. But I like the SHIELD guy, too.”

“Lucky for me.”

“I’ve missed you,” she tells him, and he realizes that she’s avoided saying it, probably to avoid putting pressure on him.

“I’ve missed you, too.”

“But this...this has been kind of nice. Talking to you without…”

“Yeah.”

“So where are you going to take me for our pie date?”

He startles at her use of the word — _date_ — but he doesn’t know why, given that he’s listened to her _come_ , except that he can’t believe she can associate that word with him.

“A ways north of Sacramento.”

“That’s a long drive, Phil. Might have to make it an overnight.”

“It’ll be worth it,” he promises.

“I wasn’t doubting that. In fact, I think I kind of like it that way.”

“Yeah?”

“You and me, getting away for a day in Lola? Spending the night together?”

He exhales hard at that.

“Unless you,” she immediately backtracks, “unless you don’t —”

“No, I do.”

“Yeah?”

“ _Yes_ ,” he sighs, and lays his head back on Lola’s headrest. “There are a lot of reasons why we shouldn’t.”

“Are there?”

“I’m old, Daisy. And we work for SHIELD and we’ll have to make hard calls and we can never have normal lives…” He closes his eyes, though and thinks about her. “But I don’t care about that.”

“No?”

“No. I just want…”

He’s not sure he can articulate what he wants, yet. And maybe that’s a disservice to her, but maybe it’s also exactly right that he can just focus on what he wants.

“I don’t want to settle for what fits into SHIELD.”

She exhales, but otherwise doesn’t respond. He’s pretty sure it’s a good silence, though

“Where are you right now?”

“I pulled off the road near a park.”

“Are you driving straight through?”

“Yeah. I’m...I’m ready to be home,” he reiterates. “I miss you.”

He hears her breath speed up.

“Daisy?”

“I’ll get to see you tomorrow?”

“Yeah,” he agrees, more than a little taken aback by how emotional she sounds about seeing him. He’s not worth that much, he’s pretty sure. “Is that okay?”

“That’s really good, Phil.” She takes a deep breath. “I just wish I could see you right now.”

“First thing in the morning,” he promises.

“Will you do something stupid for me?”

“Probably,” he answers, almost sheepish because he can’t imagine turning down any stupid thing Daisy asks him to do.

“Will you send me a picture?”

“You can’t be serious.”

“What? I said it was stupid.”

He laughs, kind of flattered, and pulls his phone away from his ear, turns on the camera, and clicks — awkward smile and wincing against the flash in the dark.

A moment later, Daisy laughs.

“That’s not very nice.”

“You need to work on sexy selfies.”

“Is that a fact?”

“Hmm, see…”

Her voice, her breathing, get distant, and then her image appears on his screen. Her face is scrubbed free of makeup for bed, her hair just a little tousled around her head from how she reclines on her pillow. Her tank top is low cut, and the way she’s arranged herself pushes her breasts up, creates the shadow of cleavage. Her mouth is just slightly open in a way that begs to be kissed.

It’s her eyes, though — smoldering and dark and mysterious — that draw him in, that make it the sexiest picture he’s ever seen.

“Coulson?”

“Jesus Christ, Daisy,” he finally manages to grind out words. “God, you’re so…”

“What am I?”

“You’re so gorgeous. Do you know how gorgeous you are?”

“Gorgeous enough that you’re going to send me another picture?”

Coulson laughs.

“Sure.”

“Undo your collar,” she instructs him, and he follows her direction, opening another button and pulling it further open around his neck. “Now hold the phone back and just a little bit up, and put your other hand...do you mind touching...yourself with the prosthetic?”

“No,” he answers easily, sliding his left hand down to press against his cock through his jeans.

“Imagine me doing that, and take a picture.”

His lips fall open as the flash goes off, and this time when Daisy looks at it, she doesn’t laugh.

“That’s a good one.”

“Were you touching yourself in the one you just sent me?”

“Uh huh,” she agrees.

“Shit, Daisy. Are you —”

“Uh huh.”

He fumbles his phone into his left hand and presses his right against his cock over his jeans, able to work his palm against himself better this way.

“What are you thinking about?” She asks him, her voice quiet and high and breathy.

“How fast I could get back if I turned on Lola’s thrusters and really pushed it.”

“Not fast enough,” Daisy answers for him.

“No?”

“No,” she sighs. “Now unzip your jeans.”

He swallows, hesitates, casting his glance around the empty desert around him.

“Come on, Phil. Do you need some motivation?”

She’s distant for another moment, and then his phone buzzes, and it’s her again — this time with her tank top pulled down enough to expose her left breast. Her left hand cups it enough that he can’t _see_ it, though, just a tantalizing tease as she bites her lip and stares into the camera.

“Fuck,” he breathes, and his right hand shakes as he lowers his zipper and pulls his cock out of his jeans.

“You have a really sexy voice,” Daisy whispers, and he can feel himself blush as he curls his fingers around himself.

“ _You_ do,” he replies, like he’s correcting her. “I love listening to you talk.”

“It’s going to be hard when you’re back,” she half-laughs. “I’ve gotten really bad about touching myself when you talk.”

“That was just twice, wasn’t it?”

“No. There were, um, some other times.”

He grips the base of his cock, as low as he can where it pokes out of his jeans, squeezes his hand tight like that might stop him from coming.

“How many?”

“A...few?”

“I thought I was imagining things.”

She laughs.

“I hope you’re not offended.”

“Offended is...definitely not the word.”

“That's good,” she whispers, and then falls into silence.

He strokes himself slowly as he listens to her, the almost-familiar sound of her breath as she touches herself, pleasures herself.

“Daisy,” he sighs her name because he’s gotten so used to it, now, to the way it feels in his mouth and the way it hits his ears and the way it makes him feel. He hadn’t been sure at first that _Daisy_ could ever mean to him what _Skye_ once did, but he knows now how stupid that was.

“Tell me what you’re doing,” she requests, her voice still soft and breathy even as she gives what amounts to an order.

“I’m…” He stumbles over it, not that he’s particularly embarrassed by words and expressions, but there’s something that makes him nervous in this situation.

“Where’s your hand, Coulson?”

“On my cock,” he manages. “Wrapped around my cock.”

Daisy lets out a low moan, and his hand moves faster just at the thought that this is arousing to her — that the thought of him means something to her.

“I really want to watch you,” she whispers, and he’d swear she sounds embarrassed. “I’ve never watched anyone before.”

“Do I get to watch you back?”

“No one’s ever watched me before, either.” She exhales, a slow breath against the receiver that makes it feel like she’s blowing in his ear. “But yeah.”

“Are you going to use your...powers?”

“Is that what you want to watch?”

“Yeah,” he sort of laughs at himself.

“Lying next to me?”

“No,” he shakes his head, stills his hand on his cock as he imagines it. “No, I want to get up close.”

“You want to stick your head between my legs.”

“In general, yes.”

“For more than just watching.”

“The second time,” he clarifies.

“Are we planning multiple times, now?”

“I’m…” Coulson clears his throat, lets his hand slide off his cock. “I’m planning a lot of times, Daisy.”

“That’s good.”

“Yeah?”

There’s a pause between them.

“You want me to use my powers on you for your second time?”

“Yes,” he hisses, and wraps his hand back around his cock, rubbing too quickly. “But my second time will come after you’ve had...four or five.”

“So generous.”

“Just realistic,” he corrects her.

She laughs at the same time that her breath hitches.

“Coulson… Are you…”

“Yeah,” he grunts. They come together, and he can’t even regret the way his own breathing covers up the sound of her tiny quiet moans, it’s so satisfying to just be in the moment _with her_.

He’s still panting for breath when his phone buzzes again with another picture of Daisy. She’s reclined in her bed, covers pulled up to her chin, with her tongue lazily poking out at him from an otherwise sleepy, satisfied face.

He laughs, even as he fumbles towards the glove box for a few tissues to take care of his mess.

“It sounds like we have a really busy day planned tomorrow,” Daisy suggests through a yawn.

“We’ll manage.”

She sighs and he can hear her snuggling further back into her bed.

“Drive save.”

“I will. I’ll see you soon.”

 

13.

He pulls into the garage just after daybreak, and cuts Lola’s engine.

Everything is quiet, and he knows he’s set off a sensor somewhere, that he can’t have come back onto the base completely unnoticed. But if no one is here to greet him, then maybe he can have this quiet entrance. It’s what he would choose, anyways.

Stepping out of Lola and taking his bag from the back, Coulson pauses uncomfortably, not quite sure what to do with himself. He’s exhausted, he needs to sleep, he wants to see her.

He’s not sure he should just go knock on her door.

So he pulls out his cell phone and calls her.

“Phil?”

Her voice is low, heavy with sleep, and he closes his eyes at the thought of hearing her like that more often. Every morning.

“Hi.”

“Where are you?”

“The garage. I didn’t know if —”

“Come here,” she chastises him, like it’s ridiculous that he would even consider an alternative.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.” She sounds so sure of herself, and then suddenly she doesn’t. “Unless you’re…”

“No. I’m…” He runs his hand down his face. “I just didn’t want to bother you if you were…”

“You don’t bother me.”

He swallows and nods, even though she can’t see, and starts across the base towards her bunk.

“How does it feel to be home?”

“Strange,” he answers, maybe too honestly. “I still haven’t figured out exactly what I want to do.”

“That’s okay. You can take your time with that.”

“I can?”

“As long as you feel sure about...this.”

“I really do.”

“Good. Everything else can wait.”

“I missed you,” he whispers as he makes his way through the halls — familiar and yet strangely unfamiliar at the same time.

“I missed you, too. I’m glad you’re home.”

He pauses at her door, debating whether to knock or just open it, when it opens for him, revealing Daisy rumbled from sleep, all messy hair and creased pajamas.

She’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.

And when she wraps her arms around his neck, he holds her back as tightly as he can, arms low on her back as he presses their bodies together.

“People are going to have a lot of questions when they realize you’re here.”

“Hmm,” he agrees, rubbing his cheek against hers and inhaling against her hair. “Can we sleep for a while before we worry about that?”

“Yeah,” she sighs and tugs him into her room, shutting the door softly behind them.

As soon as they’re in private, her fingers fly up to his shirt collar and work the buttons through their holes until she can push it down his arms and hands, around where he’s still clutching his cell phone.

He’s surprised by how forward she is, but maybe he shouldn’t be after the lines they’ve already crossed.

“You okay with this?”

She asks the question once he’s in his undershirt and her fingers are hooked through his belt.

“Yeah,” he answers, and as she pries open his belt he leans down and kisses her, getting a startled gasp before she responds. It’s slow, slow and sweet and perfect, just her lips against his as she works his zipper down.

She breaks it, though, and backs away without really touching his half-hard cock, leaving him to kick off his shoes and jeans before she presses him backwards into her bed in his tank and boxers.

Coulson lands on something hard, and has to pause to dig her cellphone out from under his back.

Their call is still going, and on the screen, set as his user icon, is the picture he sent to her last night — the one that made her laugh, all awkward smile and slight wince against the flash.

“I thought you didn’t like this picture?”

“Why would you think that?”

“You laughed.”

“Because you’re adorable,” she tells him, like he’s slow on the uptake, and he can feel himself blush. “Very adorable,” she whispers, her face and her voice and her everything somehow softer as she looks down at him.

He thinks for a moment that she’ll kiss him, but instead Daisy plucks both of their phones up and hangs them up before setting them on her nightstand.

When she turns back, she lays her hand softly on his left wrist.

“Do you take this off?”

“Yeah,” he answers, surprised at how much the creeping doubts don’t surface, at how easy it is to take off the prosthetic and let her lay it on the nightstand.

“Get some sleep, Phil,” she whispers as she spoons up against him, wrapping her whole body around his.

And it’s not the freedom of being gone, of knowing that he doesn’t have to make a life and death decision. He’ll miss that freedom, is the truth. But there’s a different kind of freedom in this, in Daisy’s bed in Daisy’s arms, in throwing out all the reasons why he’s ever thought he had to settle for something less than this.

 

 


End file.
